deiksis

Deixis, sometimes referred to as deiksis in some traditions, is a linguistic phenomenon in which the meaning of a word or expression depends on the context of its use. Deictic expressions anchor reference to the speaker, the addressee, the time of speaking, and the surrounding context, allowing speakers to refer without explicit names or descriptions. The deictic center is the vantage point from which interpretation proceeds; shifting this center changes the reference.

There are several central categories of deixis. Person deixis covers pronouns and forms that indicate participant roles (I, you, he, she, we, they) and, in some languages, verb morphology aligned with person. Place deixis includes terms like here, there, this, that, and demonstratives that signal spatial proximity. Time deixis involves temporal expressions such as now, then, soon, yesterday, or later. Discourse deixis refers to expressions that point to parts of the ongoing discourse (this, that, above-mentioned). Social deixis encodes social relationships and status through forms of address and pronouns, and may reflect formality or familiarity.

Deixis operates across languages and modalities. Interpretation relies on context, and deictic references can shift in reported speech or narration, a phenomenon known as deictic projection or backshifting. In addition to spoken language, sign languages express deixis through pointing to referents in space. Deixis is a fundamental mechanism for coherence, enabling efficient reference to people, places, times, and discourse without repeated explicit naming.